Pia Hallenberg

Everyone knows that drinking and driving is not a safe combination. Selecting a designated driver is one way to be sure an afternoon spent wine tasting doesn’t end in disaster; another way is to hire someone to do the driving. Travis Swift runs Spokane Limo Bus, and in September he began offering Saturday wine tours.

Amanda Rosler is not easily deterred. With volunteers from Gateway Church she has taken on the graffiti problem in Hillyard. The group goes house to house, knocks on doors and asks for permission to paint over or remove graffiti from buildings, sidewalks and fences.

At North Central High School’s balloon shop, Dreams Inflate, the student workers are bracing for the Halloween rush. Last year, Valentine’s Day was so busy they had to set up an assembly line to keep up with demand.

Greater Spokane County Meals on Wheels’ Silver Cafe, located at 4803 N. Nevada St., has been repainted by a crew of volunteer Americorps students from Educational Service District 101. The students all came from the group YouthBuild Spokane, a program that helps low-income youth between 18 and 29 years old who don’t have high school degrees or GEDs get job training in the construction field.

The YWCA is passing 10 purple purses around town during October, creating awareness about domestic violence and hoping to collect enough online purse check-ins to earn a $10,000 grant from The Allstate Foundation. October is domestic violence awareness month and Meagan Pierluissi, marketing and development coordinator at the YWCA, said Spokane is among 230 YWCAs across the country that have been chosen to participate in the fundraising campaign.

Eunjey Cho, 25, had traveled the world before he arrived in Spokane as a volunteer for Jesuit Volunteer Corps Northwest in 2012. After serving here for a year, he set out on a fundraising bicycle journey across the country together with his friend and fellow Jesuit volunteer, John McGuin. They named their journey “Spoke to Coaaaaaaaast!!” on the FirstGiving donation website and set a goal of raising $2,400 before reaching Cho’s hometown of Princeton, N.J.

The city is contracting with the Lands Council on a pilot stormwater management project in the Shadle area. “We are pretty excited about this,” said Mike Peterson, executive director of the Lands Council. It’s the first time the council – a local nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting the quality of life and the environment in the Inland Northwest – has contracted with the city.

When Meghan Palmer, 16, and junior at Ferris High School, began Scottish Highland dancing 12 years ago it wasn’t because she has Scottish ancestors or because she particularly liked dance. “I did it because I wanted to do something my cousin was doing,” Palmer said, laughing. “It’s really not that great of a story.”

A hot and sunny morning welcomed hundreds of United Way Day of Action volunteers to the Northeast Community Center on Sept. 12. Janice Marich, vice president of community relations at Spokane County United Way, had her hands full helping everyone find their spot on the sprawling community center campus, nearby Shaw Middle School and other locations. “We have way more than 400 volunteers here today,” Marich said. “This is also our campaign kickoff day.”

Gordon Jackson has a thing for quotes. Quotes about media, quotes about travel, quotes about career advice and politics, his collection includes several thousand 3-by-5 study cards and more than 100 books full of famous and not so famous quotes. What makes a good quote?

The magazine Highlights for Children has picked a drawing by 10-year-old Duncan Cooper to be published in its October edition. Duncan, who’s in fifth grade at Cataldo Catholic School and the son of Noah and Teresa Cooper, calls his drawing “A Rainbow in Ireland” and it shows a rainbow over green grass, dotted with raindrops.

Earlier this year it looked like two community gardens would have to be moved, because they are located too close to city wellheads and violate Washington State Department of Health drinking water regulations. The announcement surprised organizers of the Hillyard Garden, on East Hoffman Avenue and Crestline Street, and the East Central Community Garden, on East Hartson Avenue. The Hillyard garden has been in its location for three years and the East Central garden for five.

What was supposed to be an ordinary practice swim for Julie Pannell changed her life. Pannell was training for a triathlon in November 2010. She was getting out of a pool with a friend.

“Keep your eye on the ball.” That’s got to be one of the most frequently yelled instructions from a baseball coach to a team practicing for a big game. But it doesn’t quite work for Troy Leeberg, the coach, manager, president “and the everything else” of the Spokane Pride Beep Baseball Team.

Erin Streicher works in a never-ending episode of “Iron Chef,” never quite knowing what the surprise ingredient may be. Streicher is the chef at Women and Children’s Free Restaurant, in charge of preparing as many as 300 meals – all from donated food items – on any ordinary workday.

There’s a strong market for secondhand brass giraffes in Spokane. At least that’s what Jim Schrock discovered when his company, Earthworks Recycling, opened its Too Good to Recycle store nearby on Napa Street about a year ago. “Every single brass giraffe sells as soon as we put it out,” Schrock said as he walked through the store Monday morning. “And ducks. Ducks are good, too.”

It’s a story that has been repeated in a few neighborhoods this summer: a new sidewalk is going in and mature trees are cut down to make room for it, upsetting tree- and shade-loving neighbors. This time, the sidewalk went in along the north side of Lyons Avenue in front of Contempo Mobile Home Park, between Nevada and Perry streets, and 15 maple trees were cut down in the process.

A group of elementary schoolteachers spent Tuesday at the Dishman Hills Natural Area participating in a training program put on by the Dishman Hills Conservancy. It was the first time the conservancy created a program specifically to introduce the area to teachers and help them get ideas about incorporating Dishman Hills into their teaching and field trip plans.

It’s only about 1 acre of wheat, but on Thursday morning it got all the attention at East Valley Farm and Community Garden. A small combine from Crop Production Services chewed its way through the wheat as farm coordinator Lynette Romney looked on and took pictures.

For the first time in a long time, the Spokane Buddhist Temple will host an Obon festival this weekend. “We haven’t had an Obon festival in 25 or 30 years,” said Mari Haworth, Temple board member.